It costs a bit of money. Daniel Kladnik, the developer, provides you with an invoice so you can deduct it as a business, or ask your boss to pay.
https://www.no-thanks-extension.com/
Note that I haven't compared it to Fanboy's Annoyance List mentioned in the article. Ages ago, I just wanted a no-configure option.
As someone who has been involved with running small businesses, I can tell you that "the boss" very quickly gets annoyed with employees who nickle & dime their employer and try to get "the boss" to pay things that the employee should be paying for.
Sure if a piece of software, hardware or a service is an essential part of your work (e.g. mobile phones for field engineers) then it should be paid for in an appropriate manner by "the boss" (or a suitable alternative provided, e.g. company phone). No question, no argument.
But frankly, ad-blockers or other non-essentials ? Forget about it. Being a "good boss" includes being able to draw a line in the sand somewhere. A "bad boss" is one who thinks "the company" can pay for everything "just because" is doing the themselves, their employees and their company a disservice. Businesses are not charities and everyone should be doing their bit to keep overheads in control.
Not only that. But in some jurisdictions the local tax authorities will make taxation differentiation between items that are of demonstrable business needs and those that are not. This tax differentiation may not only impact the business itself, but your own personal tax situation too.
I have never met an employee who would characterize a “good boss” this way. At the very least I would not expect these qualities to win you any favours with prospective employees.
No one looks at “free work lunches” as some negative reflection of their boss’ financial acumen. The closest complaint I could think of is that the employee would rather that money go directly into their pocket. Maybe there is a middle ground here where you could allocate $50/year for these sort of expenditures in order to prevent them from getting out of hand?
I’m not sure, but I would consider reflecting on what really makes a “good boss” and whether or not your employees would agree with you on it. To me the distinction between a good boss and a bad one is always decided by the employees, never the boss.
Here I would agree and indeed I think certain people misunderstood my original comment.
What I was trying to say originally is a bad boss is one who has an open-wallet policy to "but its just $10 a year", because that sort of policy will absolutely come back and bite them or their company in the backside one day once the numbers start adding up. So yes, absolutely, set a hard dollar limit per employee and we're in agreement.
Because yes, if you don't, things will soon get out of hand (as I posted in more detail a little further down).
Yeesh, I'd hate to work for a boss like you...
I'm sorry but the "its only $10/year, the boss can pay for it" argument is complete BS.
That "its only $10/year" multiplied by how many employees ? It soon adds up.
Then we move into the same BS "only $10/year" argument that charities use when they are asking you to donate "only $5" or that Disney+ uses when it says its "only $10/month".
The "only $5" to the charity and the "only $10/month" to Disney+ is ON TOP OF all the other household expenses. So really, you are foolish to buy into the "its only" school of nonsensical argument.
So we soon find ourselves in an exponential situation. One day we say "yes, the boss will pay $10/year for this" .... roll forward a few weeks then its "oh, just another $10/year for that" ... etc. etc. ... multiplied by X employees .... soon equals $$$$.
That's why a good boss is one who is capable of standing their ground and putting that line in the sand.
Otherwise the overheads soon run away from you and you find yourself spending tens of thousands of dollars a year on "but its just $10" non-essential stuff.
Basic business good practice.
It's the lack of agency and trust in your people, rather than the specific dollar amount, that bothers me. If it was a $10,000 or even $1,000 purchase (such as buying that ad blocker for the whole company), yes, of course it should merit more evaluation, but is there really a need to micromanage every single transaction instead of having an expense account of some sort and a procedure for small purchases and reimbursements?
Not arguing that all your employees should be able to arbitrarily spend company funds willy nilly, just that they deserve some say in how they do their jobs, and the tools they need for it, instead of being simply being told "no, because if we scaled that $10 up to all the X employees it would be too expensive..." Did all the X employees even ask for that..?
When a manager evaluates what is "essential", it creates a dynamic where they either agree with me (which wastes both our time), or they disagree (which creates conflict). For $10/year, it's better to avoid the conflict and just buy the stupid tool that makes the ICs life better.